by Ian Miller
"The answer is, as yet, no," Natasha answered. "The settlers were not militarily inclined, and although they captured a lot of weapons, the collaborators are also well armed. So we have a temporary stalemate."
"Yes, but shouldn't we make some effort to break this stalemate?" Elizabeth Garrett continued. "We've got to do something, and this seems as easy as anything."
"Yes. Fight with the Martian's blood," the Mars Commissioner muttered.
"That's not fair!" Elizabeth Garrett spat back. "I know it puts the settlers lives at risk, but I wouldn't think you can fight a war without spilling some blood, and this seems to be the one place we can get at the opposition."
"As a general principle, it is better to take a lot of small easy steps than look for a big hit," Reiner noted. Commissioner Garrett looked in surprise at this unexpected source of support; Munro gave him a venomous stare, but Reiner merely laughed back at him; Halas stared in disbelief at both Garrett and Munro; while all this was going on, Commissioner Kotchetkova watched each of the players thoughtfully, as she tried to assess who had which hidden agenda. The Munro-Reiner-Halas interplay was lost on most as their attention was held on the Mars Commissioner who had launched into an irrelevant sequence of comments about corporations minding their own business.
"As it happens," Commissioner Kotchetkova said at last, "Defence believes it is premature for the settlers to attack. Commissioner Garrett is correct to note that Mars is the one place we can make contact with an enemy, but although this would be one of the weakest of enemies, there are two reasons not to. The first is that we are also weak there and we doubt the settlers can win right now. The second reason is that we feel it's strategically preferable to maintain that stalemate. It prevents the M'starn from destroying the domes, and gives them something extra to think about."
"Then we have to supply the settlers," the Mars Commissioner insisted.
"We have to supply ourselves as well," Natasha added. "All of which will cost money. Unless the Council votes adequate funds, no help is possible."
"That means extra taxes," Chu, the chief of ChinaCorp growled.
"But I presume a lot of it will be spent on the manufacturing industries, won't it?" Commissioner Garrett asked. "I presume this list will achieve these ends."
"That is the purpose of this discussion," Natasha said firmly, then she turned and gave the Justice Commissioner a nod of appreciation.
"It may not require extra taxes," Kleppe interposed. "Given the fact that I knew we were at war, I have taken the liberty to do some financial analyses. I have some figures here," he said, as he passed around a number of very fat looking documents.
"Commissioner, could you perhaps summarize?" the President asked with a touch of impatience.
"Of course," Kleppe beamed. "The very essence of the argument is that even quite moderate defence spending will actually stimulate the economy and increase tax revenue. Factories are now running at employment capacity for their level of production, but have significant excess equipment capacity. In short, a significant increase in demand can be made with little capital requirement, but there will be a significant lowering of unemployment.
"Furthermore, most of the expansion may well be in metals production, heavy engineering, and in design of new goods and retooling," Kleppe continued. "These sectors all require stimulation anyway. If we assume more manpower is required for the military, we can save trillions in benefits. To put it bluntly, had we continued on the previous course, we were heading for a massive recession. Of course, you've heard that before, and elected not to do anything about it."
"In other words, this war is a good thing?" Chu asked.
"I wouldn't put it like that," Kleppe protested, then he paused and nodded, "but from an economic point of view, it does solve those problems."
"Does that mean we need a war every now and then to get our economies straight?" Chu continued in surprise.
"Of course not," Kleppe said as he waved a schoolmasterly finger at the speaker. "Had the Council taken a responsible attitude to –"
"Order!" the President called. "The issue at hand is the Defence report."
"I apologize," Kleppe said sourly. "In answer to the question raised, as long as the money is spent in the ways indicated in the Defence document, up to about ten trillion fecus will not require significant additional tax. After that, the effect depends on how the money's spent."
"Mr President," Elizabeth Garrett rose to her feet. "I believe that fast action is required. The Commissioner has already presented a list, and I would think she has priorities already decided. I move we vote Defence an additional twenty billion fecus discretionary spending at once. That should suffice until the next meeting."
Natasha stared at this unlikely source of support. She had always thought that Garrett would be more likely to be plotting than helping. But before she had time to think about this turn of events, the money was passed and again she was asked to speak, this time at the request of Mr Chu, on the question of which corporations would receive which orders, how they would be selected, and why some would be selected ahead of others.
"This is a particularly difficult question," the Commissioner began. "In the normal course of events we would let out tenders, and take the best bids, however this would take so long the war could be lost before we got started. Accordingly, with Mr Kleppe's assistance, I propose to offer initial contracts to the corporations at a suggested price, the offers being dependent on filling unused capacity, and of course the corporation's specialist abilities. The objective here is to fill unused capacity as quickly as possible, as that ensures we get the maximum production possible in the short term. We shall require the corporations to enter into the spirit of this, and manufacture as cheaply and to the highest standard possible. If there are unfortunate economic consequences to the corporation, I propose the Council agree to honour the promise to later review evidence and recompense for unforeseen difficulties." She paused, and smiled at the greedy looks already appearing on one or two faces.
"But there is more to it than that," she continued. "It is also my intention to award some contracts to the independents without tender."
"What?" Munro roared. "You have no right."
"Order!"
"I have the right," Natasha said evenly, "and not only that, some of the manufacturing orders may go to countries outside the Federation, and in particular Brazil –"
"Mr Chairman! I protest! Our taxes should not go to boosting the economies of those not even in the Federation!" This from an excited Mr Chu.
"I support that protest in the strongest terms!"
"Mr Chairman! Members of the Council! I am not exactly certain whether the full implications of this situation have sunk in," Natasha said in a firm but cold voice that clearly showed she felt only contempt for self-seeking members of the Council. "What you see is not an attack on the Federation. It is an attack on the planet. As a consequence, we have a responsibility to inform the other dwellers of this planet of the problems we face, and give them a chance to defend themselves, and possibly give them a chance to join with us. Of course it may also pass you by that if they see things this way, it may be their taxes that pays for the goods they make."
"Who cares about them?" Munro growled. "If they won't pay the reparations, why should we help them?"
"Perhaps I can give you a simple reason why your greed is inexcusable," Natasha turned on him, her eyes blazing. "At the moment the M'starn have to cross millions of kilometers of space to get at us. Suppose South America took the same attitude to us as you have to them? Suppose they said to the M'starn, you can have as many bases as you like in South America provided you leave us alone? Wipe out the Federation with our blessing, it's all yours? What would you do then, Mr Munro?"
"We'd invade the bastards," Munro scowled. "Sort 'em out for once and for all."
"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" Natasha sneered. "But the fact of the matter is, we couldn't. Has it occurred to you what would happen if Sou
th America devoted its manufacturing capacity to the M'starn? If it allowed its troops to be used on behalf of the M'starn, to do to you what you just suggested doing to them? It may have passed you by, but the enemy has far superior technology available to it, and could wipe us out any time it liked if it were not for the fact that it may be numerically too weak. Every time you tried to move troops, they would be destroyed from space. All air transport would cease, all sea transport would cease, all roads would be destroyed. For the moment, they can't do that because they're too far away, they can't resupply themselves, and they haven't got troops to fight on the ground. So apart from the simple morality of the situation, which I guess passes you by, don't you think that could be a strategic disaster?"
Munro was about to interject, then he paused, as he realized he should not have spoken in the first place.
"Then there's the question of what we are," Natasha went on. "We are all humans, Federation members or not. But even if simple humanity means nothing to you, it does to a very large number of other citizens on this planet. If any of you can't think beyond your own selfish little interests, then I suggest you get off this Council. For those of you who can't realize that this is a golden opportunity to unify this planet, and take our civilization into the future together, so we can eventually take our place with the other great civilizations in this galaxy, then I have nothing but contempt." She sat down, and stared at each in turn. There were various levels of discomfort.
"Very well said," Commissioner Garrett murmured, breaking the silence. Once again, Natasha glanced at this unexpected source of support, but Garrett was not looking at her. The remark appeared to have been subconscious, and she was staring at her notepad.
Chapter 10
Haruhiko Takado was sitting on the top of his tank, admiring the view. He had lived all his life on this red planet without ever having left the Hellas dome and now, suddenly, he had travelled over the enormous expanses, and he had finally become enchanted with the strange harsh redness. He knew Mars was a small planet, but the size of the features seemed to defy logic. He was looking out from the northern end of the Bosporus Rupes, cliffs that ran for several hundred kilometers on the northwest of Argyre Planitia. Before him lay a scene of total desolation, yet in its own way, a haunting beauty. In the distance, the rims of craters broke the line of the horizon. Closer, slabs of harsh red rock with near vertical faces jutted upwards from the otherwise near flat plain. A great scree of rock fell from one such face on the block to his right. But it was the colours which took his breath away; the floor of the plain immediately in front was bright red, to the left were outcrops of bright yellow brown, but to the south were outcrops of distinct grey. Never before had he seen such variety.
Across the areas of Mars, a network of survival dumps had been planted. These contained the basic essentials: oxygen, carbon dioxide removal systems, food, ice, pumps, chemicals for recharging fuel cells, spare fuel cells, hydroponics equipment, and finally, pressurized shelter. When the M'starn invaded, a number of miners and people with Defence associations fled the settlements. Miners already had their own survival camps near their claims, and in some cases could live there indefinitely, but the others would have had to rely on survival dumps. Many of these were well charted but the enemy knew of their location, so it was an obvious step to move them. Many other dumps were known only to Defence and while these were available for the fleeing citizens, they had to find them. Whenever a fleeing settler found a dump with goods, he would invariably move its contents somewhere else, so the enemy would never find either the settler or the supplies. The net result was that while there were plenty of supplies available, finding these supplies was becoming more like a lottery.
Haruhiko's task was to locate as many dumps as he could, check their status, resupply those in areas that the settlers were reasonably confident they could control, and finally, if possible, to locate refugees, or to leave messages indicating how the refugees could contact the settlers. It was a tedious task, but one which gave him perhaps a unique opportunity to see Mars in its full glory and its total desolation. Thousands of kilometers of red dust, red rock, pink sky, red rock twisted in the strangest shapes, red rock in blocks of immense grandeur, gigantic red river valleys totally without water, red rock outcrops smoothed by the continual light sanding over four billion years. Mars had every shade of red-brown imaginable.
Haruhiko decided to take a last look at the view before getting back into his tank. To the east there was a small dust cloud that now looked slightly longer than it had before. It was moving! He took his binoculars, and searched. There it was. Two sources of dust were moving at high speed in a north-easterly direction. Haruhiko checked his watch, then his charts. He was in luck; Deimos was above, and hence he could use its repeater station to communicate. The most likely possibility was that they were an enemy patrol, attempting to sneak up and discover the settler's base from the south; accordingly he sent out messages to the patrols at Felis Dorsa, to ensure they spread out and kept alert. With the message sent, he drove his tiny tank squadron northwards as near to the cliff edge as he thought safe.
It was late afternoon on the next day when the objects were sighted again. The patrol on Holden saw something speeding along the easterly side of the Uzbol Vallis towards Holden. Several kilometers behind were several other vehicles, apparently in pursuit. The leading craft veered to the easterly side of Holden, and the pursuit craft followed. The patrol leader signalled what was happening to Haruhiko, who was now approaching the southern end of the Uzbol Vallis. Haruhiko consulted his maps, and immediately changed direction to the northeast. The patrol at Holden was immediately requested to fire on any vehicle emerging to the north of the Erythraea Fossa, which, as it runs slightly south of east from the south east of Holden, would be a natural barrier.
As the leading vehicle sped across the wastelands, it inevitably came to the Erythraea Fossa, but this extensive depression apparently remained unseen by the vehicle until possibly the very last instant, for instead of avoiding the depression, it slid down the bank, somehow avoided flipping, and followed the floor of the depression away from Holden. As the light was failing, the pursuers initially had no idea where their quarry had gone. They followed the tracks at speed, and the first vehicle only saw the depression at the last moment. The driver swung violently to the right, the vehicle slewed in the dust, and drifted crablike towards the edge, coming to a halt just on the edge of the fossa. Just as the driver congratulated himself, the ground below his left rear wheel gave way, and the vehicle slid another half meter towards the fossa, finishing with a wheel spinning rapidly in space, while a shower of rocks tumbled noiselessly into the gloom below. The remaining vehicles made a more circumspect approach, and after a short period of indecision they elected to follow the trail within the fossa. They winched their vehicles down the side, a move that bought the fleeing vehicle about ten minutes.
Haruhiko was in luck. His tanks reached the fossa thirty kilometers from the eastern end, and to the west, he saw the lights of the vehicles. What he was not ready for was the emergence of the first vehicle; it had no lights, and it smashed directly into the beginnings of a roadblock his men were trying to build. Again the vehicle was lucky; instead of turning over, it turned left and ran up a slope, hit a bank while its wheels were in sand, and it slowly began burying itself. For some reason, its lights also went on. Haruhiko stepped from his tank, and had walked no more than two paces towards the trapped vehicle when suddenly miniature incandescent volcanoes began erupting around it. To the west, the flash of weaponry added to the bright glow of the vehicle's lights.
Haruhiko took refuge in his tank. He ordered the other two tanks to place themselves behind what cover there was, then he engaged the second lowest gear and the tank lurched downwards, gathering speed. He gunned the motors and sped flat out across the floor of the depression until he reached the other side, then he allowed the tank to climb partly up the bank, until it was near stalling. He then swung
the steering over so the tank was starting to point its nose downwards. Weapons were still being fired at where the lights had been, but fortunately for the vehicle's crew it had now almost totally buried itself. Haruhiko lowered the gun turret and waited. The oncoming enemy now stopped firing as they crawled towards the semi-buried vehicle. Just as they stopped, Haruhiko, identifying the vehicles as collaborator scout vehicles, opened fire at the bank above them. The scout vehicles began firing at the tank, but the weapons were too light to do any significant damage. The outer shell of the tank's armour began to show signs of glowing in spots under continual beams, but no erosion of the armour occurred. The tank's major weapons now began to fire, and the first patrol car leaped in the air, overturned, and the bright yellow glow of burning sodium pouring down onto the Martian surface showed that the batteries that this type of scout car seemed to have had been ruptured. Sodium was an unusual element; it would burn in the sands of Mars, it would burn in carbon dioxide; it was one of the few fires possible on Mars. When the second car was similarly destroyed, the remaining cars now surrendered.
Haruhiko and a young Chinese medical student now entered the partially buried scout car through the air lock in the roof. While Haruhiko was turning off the motor, the medical student was examining the sole driver, who was slumped face forward over the controls.
"Is he badly hurt?" Haruhiko asked.
"No, honourable sir," the student beamed.
"When can we talk to him, then?"
"About ten hours, I'd guess sir. He's asleep."
"Asleep?"
"At a guess, I'd say he's gone without it for about three days, and his body's finally demanded it. I'd guess he's driven the whole length of the fossa asleep."
* * *
Loneliness was no stranger to Lawrence Baxter. Many times over the past few months he had wondered whether he had made the correct choice. Inevitably he decided he had got it half right; if only he had brought a friend. If only he had a friend. Preferably female!
